Talk:Episode 138 (9th April 1962)
I'm not sure if this merits a mention or not, but, following the death of Doreen Keogh (on 31st December 2017), this became one of the first episodes (if not the sole first episode) in the shows history that features only actors who are now deceased. It is especially interesting that it is this episode, since this is the first to be planned after the equity strike had ended (the previous episode being the first that aired after it, but having surely been written and planned during the strike) yet every single one of the first 137 episodes has at least one surviving cast member, even during the equity strike from episode 94 onwards, and particularly even during the period of the 'core 14' from episode 104 onwards, of which period only William Roache and Philip Lowrie are still alive. Even during the short period after Philip's contract ended until the end of the strike, at which point the 'core 13' comprise only one still living actor, that actor, William Roache, managed to then appear in every single episode until the end of the strike. 03:40, September 13, 2018 (UTC) :It would be of interest but we need to be sure. You state "this became one of the first episodes (if not the sole first episode)" which sounds a little uncertain. Also, there are 25 episodes from 1961 whose cast lists we have yet to verify against TV Times.--Jtomlin1uk (talk) 07:58, September 13, 2018 (UTC) : Sorry I was a little hasty in adding the bit in brackets about it possibly being the sole first episode to feature only actors who are now deceased, as I discovered immediately after writing here that the next episode, #139, also only features now deceased actors. I have now checked the cast lists (on corriepedia) of the first 250 epsiodes, and there are only 3 episodes in total that do not have at least one main cast member who is currently still living. Apart from the two already mentioned, the other one is episode #42, but in this instance a member of the guest cast, Renny Lister, is still living. I'm going to continue checking the 60s episodes as and when I've got time, but unless there is another major strike akin to the 1961 strike, or unless a lot of the younger (and thereby still living now) cast happened to leave at around the same time, it's hard to imagine there being any more such episodes any further into the 60s, as by #250 there are 6 still-living actors in the main cast, and most or all of them seem to appear in any given episode. I will grant you though I'm only going by the cast lists as they are shown on Corriepedia, and only confirming a cast member as being deceased if information about their death is on this website (i.e. if Corriepedia does not have a death year for a particular actor then I make the assumption they are still alive, although in some case that would be unlikely, as for example with Norah Hammond who played Ken's gran, whose death must surely have occured at some point in the 5 decades since, but which seems not to be reported anywhere online). 00:16, October 3, 2018 (UTC)